III. The CHRONOGRAPHIES of the ASSYRIANS, BABYLONIANS, and EGYPTIANS, examined and compared with the Scriptures. SECTION I. Assyrian and Babylonian Chronology. § 487. THE Bible History, in the seventh and eighth centuries B. C., furnishes a few synchronisms by means of which the scanty, and often incongruous notices which we possess in a few fragments of Berosus and Ctesias, in Herodotus and Diodorus, and the Canons of the Chronographers, may be reduced into somewhat of order and consistency. To adjust these notices, and to clear up the confusion in which the two last centuries of Assyrian History have been involved by a gross misstatement of Ctesias, will be my first undertaking. In the next place, I shall make it appear that the origins of Assyria and Babylon, according to the national accounts themselves, reach no higher than the century to which Moses, in our chronology, assigns the Dispersion of Nations. And lastly, I shall shew that the chronographies of these Empires are constructed upon an artificial plan, adapted to a certain numerical measure. In the succeeding section it will appear that the same measure is still more conspicuously the basis of the Egyptian chronographies: nay, even the remoter chronologies of Southern and Eastern Asia exhibit the same artificial structure based on the same measure. (Note to Sect. 1.) This phenomenon, highly curious in itself, becomes very remarkable when viewed in connexion with the fact, that the measure itself appears to be derived from the Mosaic chronology of the period immediately subsequent upon the Flood. Did all these nations derive it from a common tradition coeval with their dispersion from the plain of Shinar? Or, did it travel (with the Sothiac cycle) from Egypt to Babylon, from the Euphrates to the Ganges, and thence to the furthest East? These questions I do not take upon me to decide. It is enough for me to invite attention to the fact, which, however it is to be accounted for, is too plain to be gainsaid. § 488. In the Scriptures we find the names of the following Assyrian kings: Pul, contemporary with Menahem, 2 Kings xv. 19. (B. c. 771–760.) Shalmaneser, with Hoshea and Hezekiah, 2 Kings xvii. 4. (723.) Sennacherib, 2 Kings xviii. 13. (B. c. 713.) Esarhaddon, his son, 2 Kings xix. 37. (The same, or another of the same name in Ezra iv. 2.) A king of Assyria, not named, took Manasseh captive to Babylon. 2 Chron. xxiii. 11. (supra p. 244. f.) The name of Sennacherib and a disguised relation of his miraculous overthrow are recorded in a well-known passage of Herodotus ii. 141. (comp. Berosus ap. Joseph. Ant. x. 1-4.) The conquests of Shalmaneser are mentioned, but without his name, by Menander the Ephesian, ap. Joseph. Ant. ix. 14. 2. § 489. The fortunate discovery of the Armenian Eusebius has added to our sources of intelligence on the subject of Assyrian and Chaldean history two extracts from Berosus, one preserved by Alexander Polyhistor, the other by Abydenus. By comparing these with the notices of Scripture, and with the Canon of Herodotus and Ctesias, we may be able to illustrate this portion of history. In the former passage, Polyhistor, having described, from Berosus, the period from the Deluge down to Semiramis, minute enumerat nomina regum 45, assignans illis annos 526. Post quos, inquit, rex Chaldæorum fuit cui nomen Phulus, de quo item Hebræorum quoque historia meminit, Phulum denominans, quem in terram Judæorum venisse aiunt. Ac post eum Senecheribum Polyhistor fuisse regem ait. Of the intermediate kings no mention is made: then, “Postquam regnasset frater Senacharibi (meaning perhaps, Sargon) et deinde postquam Acises in Babylonios dominatus esset et necdum 30 quidem diebus regnum obtinuisset, a Marodach Baladano occisus est; et M.B. per vim regnum tenuit 6 mensibus; eum vero interficiens regnabat quidam cui nomen Elibus. Verum tertio regni ejus anno Senecheribus rex Assyriorum exercitum conflabat adversus Babylonios, prælioque cum iis commisso vicit, et captum una cum amicis in terram Assyriorum perduci jussit. In Babylonios ergo dominatus, regem iis filium suum Asordanium constituit; ipse vero recedens terram Assyriorum petiit. Quum autem ille fama accepisset Græcos in Ciliciam belli movendi causa pervenisse, ad eos contendit; aciem contra aciem instruit ac plurimis quidem de suo exercitu cæsis hostes (tamen) debellat atque in victoriæ monumentum imaginem suam eo in loco erectam reliquit, Chaldaicisque literis fortitudinem suam ad futuri temporis memoriam incidi jussit. Et Tarsum urbem (inquit) ipse ad similitudinem Babylonis condidit quem appellavit Tharsin. Et post omnia facta Sinnecherimi illud quoque addens ait eum 18 annis vixisse (in imperio;) et per insidias quas illi paravit filius Ardumusanus e vita excessisse.” "Regnavit Sinecherim, ut Polyhistor exponit, annis 18, et post eum ejusdem filius annis 8. Postea vero Sammughes annis 21, et frater ejus annis 21. Ac deinde Nabupalsar annis 20, et post eum Nabucodrossorus annis 43. (A Sinecherimo usque ad Nabucodrossorum comprehenduntur anni omnino 88.) "Post Sammughen vero Sardanapallus Chaldæus regnavit annis 21. Hic exercitum Astyagi Medo, familiæ principi ac satrapæ, auxilio misit, ut Amuhiam Astyagis filiam Nabucodrossoro filio suo uxorem daret. Ac deinde regnavit Nabucodrossorus annis 43, et contractis copiis veniens captivos duxit Judæos et Phoenices ac Syros." Chron. Armeno-lat. 41-44. Now since the epoch of Nebuchadnezzar is B. c. 604, we have here for which is much at variance with the Scriptures; for Sennacherib was on the throne 713 B. C., and did not long survive the discomfiture of his armies which took place in that year. Moreover, Sardanapallus is made successor to Sammughes and with the same length of reign (21′), and then is identified with Nabopolassar father of Nebuchadnezzar. It is manifest, then, that there is some confusion here. It seems that this identification is due to Polyhistor; to him, at least, Syncellus ascribes it in the following passage: "This Nabopolassar Polyhistor calls Sardanapallus, and says that he sent to Astyages satrap of Media and took his daughter Amuita to wife for his own son Nebuchadnezzar. He (Nabopolassar) having been sent on an expedition by Saracus king of the Chaldeans as his general, made invasion upon Saracus himself at Nineveh. Saracus, alarmed at his approach, set fire to his palace and perished in the flames. So this same Nabopolassar, father of Nebuchadnezzar, obtained the empire of the Chaldeans." Here we have the name Saracus, which does not appear in the excerpt from Polyhistor. Let us look now at the other extract: that of Abydenus. § 490. Eodem tempore 25tus utique Sinecherib ipse ex regibus vix demum inventus est (?) qui Babylonem sub ditionem redigens subegit, et ad littus maris Cilicia Græcorum classem profligatam depressit; condiditque templum Athenarum (?), statuas areas erexit, literisque sane (inquit) suam fortitudinem exaravit; et Tarsum ad figuram et similitudinem Babylonis ædificavit; ut Tarsum Cydnus flumen interflueret, Euphratis nimirum more Babylonem interfluentis. Ex ordine autem post eum Nergilus regnavit qui a filio Adramelo est interemptus: et ipsum quoque frater ejus Axerdis ex eodem patre, non autem ex eadem matre, occidit; et exercitum persequutus in Byzantinorum(?) urbem includit....Axerdis autem Ægyptum partesque Syriæ inferioris in suam potestatem redegit; ex qua Sardanapallus quoque extitit (or, hinc Sardanapallus exortus est). Post quem Saracus in Assyrios regnavit: et quum compertum habuisset multitudinem barbarorum maximam e mari exisse, ut impetum faceret, Busalossorum ducem confestim Babylonem misit. Ille autem consilio rebellionis inito, Amuhiam Astyagis Medi familiæ principis filiam Nabuchodrossoro suo filio uxorem despondit. Ac deinde protinus discedens accelerat aggredi Ninum, id est, urbem Ninive. Cum autem de his omnibus certior est factus Saracus rex, concremavit regiam aulam Evoriti (?). Nabuchodrossorus vero accipiens regni imperium valido muro Babylonem cinxit. Chron. Armeno-lat. 53. Confused as this account is in some respects, it clears up the perplexity occasioned by the other statement; for it appears that the succession was as follows: That is to say, Polyhistor, or those who copied the extract from him, have confounded Nabopolassar and Sardanapallus, or, in other words, have substituted the one reign of Nabopolassar or Busalossor for the two, Sardanapallus and Saracus. And since the epoch of Nebuchadnezzar is B.C. 604, and the sum of the years specified by Polyhistor is 91, we have for the epoch of Asordan or Esarhaddon son of Sennacherib, 695 B. c. plus the years of Saracus between the death of Sardanapallus and the epoch of Nabopolassar. § 491. Now the time of the final overthrow of Nineveh and the Assyrian empire is thus determined: 1. It must have occurred before the year 606 B. C., for Jeremiah, in a prophecy delivered in that year, in which he recites "all the kings of the North, far and near", makes no mention of Nineveh and Assyria. 2. We know from Herodotus i. 103 ff. that the capture of Nineveh by Cyaxares took place after the famous eclipse of Thales. Now Ideler has proved, on a calculation furnished by Oltmanns, that the eclipse in question was that of 30 September B.c. 610. Handb. der Chronol. i. 209. 3. This capture occurred after the expulsion of the Scythians. Now these barbarians, according to Herodotus, held Asia 28 years out of the 40 during which Cyaxares was king, ib. 106. But Cyaxares began to reign 40 (Cyax.) + 35 (Astyages) before the overthrow of the Median empire by Cyrus, i.e. 559+75 = 634 B.c. And the Scythian invasion of that part of Asia occurred early in the reign; for Cyaxares, to avenge the defeat and death of his father Phraortes, invaded Nineveh, defeated the Assyrians, and was laying siege to Nineveh itself when he was obliged to withdraw by the irruption of a vast army of Scythians, ib. 103. Now 28 years from 634 B. C. reach to 606 B. C. The meaning, then, of Herodotus's statement may be, that there was an interval of 28 years from the accession of Cyaxares to the capture of Nineveh which ensued after the expulsion of those barbarians. It seems to me that this was indeed the year of the taking of Nineveh, and that Nebuchadnezzar, not his father, took part with Cyaxares in the siege, and having brought it to a conclusion, set out on his expedition into Syria and Judæa. But this cannot be the siege of which Berosus (in Abydenus) speaks; that, namely, in which Saracus perished: for that coincided with the revolt of Busalossor or Nabopolassar, who began to reign in Babylon B. c. 625 (Canon, supra p. 485). There must therefore have been some other king of Assyria after Saracus; and it is interesting to observe that the list of Castor, preserved, in a very corrupt form indeed, in the Excerpta Barbara of Scaliger, ends after Sardanapallus or Thonus Concoleros with Ninus, to whom it assigns a reign of 19 years. Now 606+19=625 B.C. Eusebius also found a Ninus at the close of the Assyrian Canon: chronologiæ principium a Nino duximus et in alterum Ninum qui regnum a Sardanapallo accepit desinimus: and at 608 B. c. he says; Cyaxares Medus Ninum occidit. What we are to understand by the words multitudinem barbarorum maximam e mari exisse, in the passage of Berosus, it is hard to say: the Scythians, we have seen, were in Asia at least nine years earlier. Perhaps the meaning may be, that an attack of these barbarians on Nineveh was expected at that time (625 B.C.). And this may have been that very incursion which obliged Astyages (=Cyaxares) to abandon the siege of Nineveh. This seems to me a fair way of reconciling the several accounts: that is: § 492. B.c. 634. Cyaxares ascends the throne of the Medes: the Scythians enter Asia about this time: 625. The Scythians march towards Nineveh, which Cyaxares cir. B. c. 609.-When Cyaxares after the engagement with the In what year then did Saracus succeed to Sardanapallus? for the length of his reign is not given. Perhaps at the same time as Cyaxares began to reign. For in the Canon of Castor we find the two last reigns given thus: 37. Tonus Concolerus qui vocatur Græce Sardanapallus, annos. .......XXX 38. Ninus................ And the list ends with this statement: Simul reges 39 antiqui Assyriorum perseverantes annos 1430. Yet only 38 kings are enumerated: one therefore is omitted, perhaps Saracus is included with Sardanapallus, with a reign of 9 years, making with the 21 of Sardanapallus, the sum of 30 years. I am aware that this Sardanapallus is placed by Castor and Eusebius much earlier than 625 B. C.; but there is a confusion here which I shall endeavour to clear up presently. If then, we suppose that |